School desks have traditionally been made of wood, and sometimes with metal bases which are either freely positionable on or fixed to the classroom floor. It is also known to make school desks which are entirely made of metal except for the writing surface.
For aesthetic reasons, wood desks are more desirable. However, the labor costs associated with the metal work required to build desks from metal are less than a wooden construction. It is less expensive to braze metal parts than to join wood parts together. Therefore, it is hard for a wood desk to compete with a metal desk for price, and the school boards purchasing large quantities of desks cannot justify a significantly greater expenditure for the sake of aesthetics.
Two factors make wood construction more expensive than metal. The first is joining parts together, and the second is edge banding (finishing). In a hybrid metal and wood construction, some joining can be reduced by fixing wood parts to metal ones, however, edge finishing remains a problem.